


ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse concupiendam

by janie_tangerine



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: (I THINK IT QUALIFIES), Academia, Age Difference, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Teachers, Awkward Flirting, Bad Puns, Class Differences, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Sexuality Crisis, Single Parents, The Author Regrets Nothing, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, asoiaf rarepair santa, bad puns starting from the title i have a feeling sorry not sorry, davos is honestly better than your faves and stannis agrees, horrible carthage-related puns i'm sorry guys, stannis is a disaster at romance good thing davos isn't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-27
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-28 19:46:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17189234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janie_tangerine/pseuds/janie_tangerine
Summary: “Right. And how do you feel when you talk to this guy? Just checking.”“Is this really necessary?”“I’m afraid it is.”He breathes in. “I don’t know, if he doesn’t come to class because he can’t move his shift around it’s a disappointment, the one time we went for drinks after it because we’re apparently on a first name basis now, I could barely drink because my entire stomach was clenching on itself all the time but not in a bad way, when he handed me my glass in the pub my fingers brushed against his and I’m not going to tell you what I spent the entire ride back home thinking because you don’t deserve to be subjected to that, too, and I don’t know, I left my nine month old daughter with him when I barely knew his damned name, what else should I even say now?”Jon takes another sip of tea. “Congratulations,” he says, “you’re really into this guy.”Stannis wants to die inside.“And there’s nothing bad about it.”Or: in which archaeology TA Stannis Baratheon has to juggle teaching a class he hates, being a single father and having fallen for the university's janitor who also attends his classes.





	ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse concupiendam

**Author's Note:**

> OKAY SO this is my humble contribution to the rare pair exchange at [asoiafrarepairs](https://asoiafrarepairs.tumblr.com/), the original request by [tieflng](http://tieflng.tumblr.com/) was for Stannis/Davos aaaaand after we discussed a few things and noticing we both share a liking for Carthage when it comes to ancient history....... here you go, have archaeology TA!Stannis Who Is Really Into Carthage trying to survive single-fathering his kid with Davos being the only person in his class who actually cares about the subject. ( ~~Bonus Jon C. happened because I decided he was the best person around to share the sage advice Stannis needed to hear.~~ ) I AM HONESTLY SORRY FOR THE AMOUNT OF HORRID PUNS IN THIS FIC and I really hope you like it - happy holidays even if I'm in the nick of time ;) also endless thanks to tumblr user(s) robb-greyjoy for proofreading and wynafryd-manderly for confirming me I wasn't coming up with nonsensical stuff for the archaeological part of this thing ( ~~guys I come from philosophy have pity on me~~ ).
> 
> As usual: NOTHING here belongs to me whatsoever and Cato the Elder _will_ have my hide in the afterlife for what I did with his catchphrase in the title but I regret nothing. ;)

 

I

 

 _This_ , Stannis thinks as he tries to figure out how he’s ever going to survive the next six hours, _is not my day_.

Admittedly, it’s not his week, his month or his _year_ either, but he had gotten as far as understanding _that_ — now he has way more pressing matters.

For one, trying to not tell Renly things that he will most likely regret the moment their phone call is over.

“Renly, for — I need to go to this interview, it’s in the morning, I’d take her back after lunch at most.”

“Can’t you ask anyone else?”

“ _Who_? Come on, should I ask Robert to keep my nine-month old daughter who’s spent more time in a hospital than outside, at his workplace, or worse, at his house where the only present adult would be _Cersei_?”

Like _hell_ he’s going to do that. He doesn’t want Robert anywhere near his kid, thank you very much, and Renly’s supposedly studying for finals and lives in his own _nice_ apartment, so there is absolutely no question of who he should be asking, out of the two.

“I’m not good with kids,” Renly sighs.

 _I’m not either_ , Stannis wants to say, _but I’m trying anyway, for that matter_. “You don’t have to be _good_ with her.”

He was about to say something, but then Renly tells him to hold on, then rummages through some paper, or so it sounds like. “Wait,” he says, and, “oh, snap, I had forgotten.”

“What?”

“Sorry, there’s an emergency meeting of the student union at my faculty in half an hour. I’ve gotta go, but if you want to call Loras maybe he can keep her,” he says, and then he closes the call.

For —

Stannis takes a deep breath and tries to _not_ grind his teeth.

Renly’s boyfriend might _not_ be a bad choice, admittedly, but they’ve talked maybe three times in their entire life when Renly wasn’t in the house and Stannis is really not too big on calling him out of the blue and asking him to keep his nine-month old kid for half of the day.

Robert is absolutely _not_ an option.

It’s probably sad that it’s where his options end.

He takes another very, very deep breath and figures that he’s going to have to do this bringing the baby with, which is _not_ going to look professional whatsoever.

Then again, at least his kid tends to be a lot quieter than most, or surely she’s quieter than Robert’s one son, so maybe she’ll just sleep through it. _Maybe_. He fixes his tie and jacket, he’s _not_ going to get there not looking presentable, spares a moment to feel thankful that it’s the middle of July and not winter because bringing Shireen over on public transport would have been a nightmare otherwise (he really needs to get himself a license, doesn’t he), grabs both _his_ own work bag and the one he uses for Shireen’s things, picks his daughter up miraculously _not_ walking her up and leaves the house. He doesn’t know how he manages to lock the door without either his daughter or the bags falling to the ground but he does; the only good thing is that it’s early enough that the bus isn’t full and that he doesn’t have to switch, but it’s about the only good news today.

By the time he’s arrived, he’s had to glare at some five kids who were finding hilarious that his daughter’s left cheek is covered in chicken pox scars that will most likely not go away (or so the doctors said), he’s gone through all the possible ways this interview will go _bad_ , has cursed both of his brothers a fair amount of times and has ran through every bad scenario in which he needs to save money carefully if anything today goes wrong.

Which he supposes is _not_ the best attitude if he wants this morning to go over well, but never mind that — he walks into his building, bypassing enough students who are most likely wondering if he’s one of them, and no, he hasn’t been in a while and he didn’t even relish actually, well, interacting with any, but bills must be paid after all.

He’s outside the supervisor’s door some fifteen minutes before everyone is bound to arrive, and he sits down on the nearest chair hoping he’ll catch his breath… except that _his daughter_ catches hers, wakes up and starts crying.

 _Oh, not now_ , he thinks, but he’s recognized from the way she’s crying that it’s because she wants someone to cuddle her for the next half hour and while he would be up for the task at any other moment, he has no time now, not when he has to run through what he has to tell Jon Arryn and when he _can’t_ bring her inside if she’s wailing. Except that whenever it’s like this it takes her a while to calm down, and as he tries to bounce her a few other people pass by and glare, _of course they do_ , and —

“Hey, not to pry, but — do you need some help?”

Stannis, having dumped his bags on the ground, stands up and looks at his right, and — oh. It’s one of the janitors, who’s about the first person looking at him as if he’s actually worried rather than wishing he’d disappear along with his wailing kid. The man has some ten years on him at least, is slightly shorter but with a lean, lithe build, brown hair and beard spiked with a few gray hairs and is looking at him with warm chestnut-brown eyes, and Stannis wouldn’t usually trust complete strangers, but he’s at the end of his rope, he’s slept some four hours tonight and he needs to be presentable before Jon Arryn and the others show up.

“Well,” he says, “I couldn’t find anyone to keep my daughter, I have an interview with the department’s head in some ten minutes to see if I can convince him to let me teach classes next year, because I was supposed to go on an excavation but I _really_ cannot afford to bring her around. Before you ask, the mother is not in the picture.”

And if it’s up to him, she won’t be at any point soon — it’s not as if he and Selyse ever were a good match in the first place, but he hasn’t seen her since she told him that her daughter being _disfigured_ was some kind of divine warning that their marriage was a mistake and left, and when he came back home he had only found her things gone.

He’s not going to think about the divorce papers he will have to sign a few months from now.

“And, I guess I am — hardly the best choice today,” he sighs. The man looks at him, most likely taking in his pitiful appearance, and Stannis is about to thank him for even having asked, but then —

“Er, Mr. —”

“Baratheon,” Stannis sighs. “Stannis Baratheon.”

“Mr. Baratheon. I know that you have absolutely zero reasons to trust strangers with _your_ children, but I’ve had a few of my own and my shift was over ten minutes ago. If you want me to keep her until you’re done, that’s no problem.”

Stannis glances at the man’s name tag. “Mr. — _Seaworth_?”

“Oh, I could’ve just introduced myself as well. That’s right.”

Stannis takes a better look at the man. In different circumstances, he’d say no at once, but Shireen wails louder and it’s minutes left, and Arryn is _never_ late, and if he doesn’t convince him he’s going to have to go to _Tunisia_ with a kid younger than two, which is absolutely _not_ doable. He _does_ look trustworthy, Stannis thinks, and anyway, he works here and he knows name and surname.

“If — if you would,” Stannis blurts, “that would be — ideal. But… why? I mean, your shift ended now then it was the night one, you must be tired.”

“And _you_ , Mr. Baratheon, look like you’re about to explode and like your day has been exceedingly terrible, and given that it’s barely nine in the morning, I think I can afford to lose an hour of my life at most if it means you won’t have to bring her into a job interview.”

Handing Shireen over to Seaworth is about the _one_ thing Stannis has done out of instinct in his entire life, and for a moment he thinks that he’s done something exceedingly stupid —

For a moment, because a few seconds later she… _stops crying_?

“ _How_ did you do that in ten seconds?” Stannis asks.

“Told you,” Seaworth grins, “I’ve had a few myself. I’ll wait around here, how about that?”

“That — that would be ideal,” Stannis nods. “Thank you, I —”

“You’re welcome. And good luck with your supervisor.”

Stannis nods and grabs his own bag, just seconds before Arryn shows up with the four others from the department who have to interview him. They shake hands, Arryn tells him to please get inside the room so they can be done sooner, and Stannis is going to have Renly’s head for forcing him to leave his daughter with a complete stranger.

 _After_ he’s done convincing them that it’s in everyone’s best interest if he _doesn’t_ go to the Carthage excavation in September.

——

“Are you _really_ sure about this?” Arryn asks him. “I mean, of course there wouldn’t be an issue with having you teach that one class and Lannister could probably use the time at the excavation for that book he’s meant to write for years, so I’m sure he would be glad to leave it to you, but that entire research project would take some four years at latest. You cannot go back on it and I know how much you fought to be on that team.”

 _Haven’t I_ , Stannis thinks bitterly. “I know,” he says. “But with my current — familial situation, I cannot really afford to go and I certainly cannot bring a child along. Not on my own. I — I imagine there will be other chances in the future.”

“Hopefully,” Arryn sighs. “You never know when they’ll stop funding us. Anyway, if you can come back in an hour, I’ll call Lannister and ask him to drop by so we can finalize it within the day.”

“Of course,” Stannis agrees. He had hoped that he wouldn’t have to stay much longer, but he hasn’t heard Shireen cry until now and maybe if Seaworth really calmed her down and hasn’t kidnapped her or _something_ , she will handle being outside until then. “That would be no problem at all. Thank you very much, I — I really appreciate it.”

“I’m just sorry that we won’t get your two cents, but I suppose that you would be amenable to review Lannister’s articles, in case? Since it was your specific field and all.”

“I would be delighted,” Stannis half-lies. He wouldn’t because he had _coveted_ that job, but on the other side Tyrion Lannister is _not_ a slouch and can do his job and doesn’t write pedantically, so he could do a lot worse than _that_.

“Then see you in a while,” Arryn says, shaking his hand. Stannis shakes it back, does it with the others, too, and leaves the room letting out a large, deep breath and trying to not let his papers fall down since he hasn’t even bothered to stuff them back into his bag.

And he’s also relieved to see that Seaworth is still sitting outside the room and that Shireen is sleeping in the crook of his arm.

“I feel like I should ask you how you did it _again_ ,” Stannis says, dropping on the nearby seat.

“Told you, it takes practice. I imagine you want her back?” He hands her back to him and Stannis takes his daughter carefully — better if she sleeps through the entire charade later.

“Thank you again,” Stannis sighs. “I really was at the end of my rope.”

“Oh, that’s quite all right.” Seaworth stands up. “So, did you get the job?”

“The — oh. Yes. Well, I had to ask them to give me next year’s bachelor Ancient History class rather than sending me on the excavation I should have gone to, but — well. The mother is not in the picture, so.”

“I see,” Seaworth says, sympathetically. “Well, then I’ll see you around the place, Mr. Baratheon. Have a good day.”

“Same to you,” Stannis tells him. “And — thanks again. I mean, my own brother couldn’t make time for it, so — never mind.” He doesn’t know why he’s telling the man that, but he did prove trustworthy, he needs to tell _someone_ and he’s just… tired, he figures.

“It really was no problem. She’s cute, for that matter.” He yawns. “Sorry, I’ve been up a while.”

“Oh, don’t let me keep you. Thank you. Have — have a good day.”

Seaworth gives him a nod and disappears from the hallway.

Stannis is _not_ going to think about what expects him at the beginning of the next academical year and will settle for being glad that this hellish day somehow didn’t turn out to be utter shit before eleven AM.

 

II

 

“Any questions?”

Stannis is _not_ surprised when the entire class is silent.

He breathes in. “Very well. Then I will see you next Friday at the same hour. Please remember that we’re commenting Livy’s account of Hannibal for the entire class, so _please_ come here having read book twenty-one of the _History of Rome_ , or you might find it hard to follow.”

“ _What_?” Some student in first row who until now had been sleeping asks. “Since _when_ did we have to read it?”

Stannis sighs. “It has been on the obligatory reading list since I published it in September.”

“But I thought you had to read that stuff _before finals_ , not —”

“It’s not such a long read, I’m sure you can handle it before next Friday.”

The student stares at him in a fairly disappointed way, but then he shrugs, mutters something about ruining his plans to go out drinking and starts gathering his things.

No one stops to ask him questions or anything on the way out.

“I hate this,” he groans the moment the last student walks out of the door. For — if they can’t even handle reading _Livy_ , they’re going to hate him even more the moment he moves on to, well, _Roman_ sources to modern ones. Hell, he remembers that back when _he_ was attending this same class with Jeor Mormont students were way more receptive — but then again, _Stannis_ certainly doesn’t have the charisma he had, nor the gift, for that matter. His thing had always been going on excavations and doing research work hands-on, not teaching the bachelor’s class.

He glances at the time — he has another two hours of receiving students before going back home, and he’s going to thank all the saints he doesn’t believe in for having found out that his neighbor works from home, is good with kids, is actually raising the kid of his best friend or _something_ while working from home _and_ is fine with looking after his daughter when Renly or Loras can’t, because if he had to pay someone for it, his paycheck would be gone in flames by this point.

Then again, most students who drop by only want some more explanations because they missed class once in a while or complain about too much workload for the semester — considering that it consists in Livy’s account of the Punic wars, _one_ monograph written in the damned 19th century because his field is so well-off that it’s still a good choice even if dated and another three articles… he doesn’t even want to know how _that_ is too much workload.

Well, he has some fifteen minutes before he has to be in his office — formerly Lannister’s, but of course he’s using it for the time being. Maybe he can stop at the bar for a tea, even if he hates not taking his time with it.

And he has four years of this in front of him. _Great_.

“I see they’re testing your patience?”

Stannis looks up and — oh. That’s Davos Seaworth standing on the classroom’s door. Stannis can’t help it — he can feel his back relaxing a tiny bit. “Maybe they are,” he says, “but then again — I never was great at _this_.”

“Well, I heard some of it,” Seaworth says. “You aren’t _that_ bad.”

Now that’d be the _first_ time anyone tells him _that_.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You aren’t,” Davos shrugs. “I mean, fine, if you accept constructive criticism…”

“Of course I do, it’s not as if I don’t know I’m abysmal at _teaching_.”

“The delivery is a bit wooden and it’s obvious you don’t want to be here, but other than that, it’s not _that_ terrible. Also, I guess it’s interesting.”

“Now if — wait, _interesting_?”

Seaworth shrugs and _then_ Stannis notices that there’s a paperback stuck inside his work jacket.

“I suppose you like Roman history?” He asks. He figures Seaworth would, since it’s Caesar’s _Gallic Wars_ in a fairly battered edition.

“I guess this requires a longer answer, but well, thing is, before this gig I was in the mining field.”

Stannis cringes at once. “I… guess that the government screwed you over?”

“You could say so,” Seaworth replies. “Long story short, I started when I was just out of school and I kind of blew it back in the day. But since I’ve been working here I figured that hey, I have more free time now and I’m not too tired when I come home at the end of the day to do much, so why not take advantage of being in a university all the time?”

Stannis nods — it makes sense, and he doesn’t see why people _wouldn’t_ take advantage.

And then — well, he’s tired and he most likely can’t believe someone’s just told him that his teaching isn’t _boring_ , but — oh, damn it to hell and back.

“You know,” he says, “this is a public lecture.”

“… Sorry?”

“I guess it might not work with your shifts, but — the lectures are public. You could attend… if you wanted, of course.”

Seaworth’s eyes go slightly wider, his lips parting slightly as if he hadn’t expected the invitation. “I _guess_ I could make it sometimes, depends on which shifts I get,” he says. “But — really?”

“Why not?” Stannis shrugs. “If you’re interested and my teaching doesn’t bore you to death, no one stops you.”

“That’s — nice of you.”

“What aren’t you saying?” Stannis asks, feeling that Seaworth is trying to hold back something he was about to say, and then he realizes that it might have been a bit _too_ forward, and — he’s not this kind of person, usually. He’s _not_. “I apologize, I had no —”

“It’s all right,” Seaworth interrupts him, _thankfully_. “I might have asked a couple of your colleagues but they weren’t too much into the idea, a year ago or so.”

“Why?”

“Most of them didn’t vote where I do and they didn’t appreciate sharing vital space with the lower class,” Seaworth says, and good thing he sounds amused more than anything else.

“Well,” Stannis says, “the only thing I value when it comes to students is how much they’re willing to learn and that they actually put some minimum work into passing my class, so if you want to attend, you’re welcome to.”

Seaworth looks honestly touched at that, which — is _weird._ People aren’t usually touched when he says _anything_ , for that matter.

“Why, thanks. I might take you up on it. And how’s your daughter?”

Stannis can’t help thinking, _it’s kind of sad that he would ask and Robert hasn’t in months_. “Oh, pretty well. I mean, she’s holding up fine and she had no other chicken pox consequences, so. At least that.”

“Well, good to know. Ah, fuck, I need to go ahead, I’m on shift in theory, but thank you for the offer.”

“No problem at all,” Stannis replies as the man nods and turns his back on him.

Well.

If he actually _does_ attend… maybe he will have _one_ student who doesn’t hate his curricula.

He can hope.

 

III

 

It’s not that he hadn’t expected Seaworth to take him up on the offer.

But he hadn’t expected Seaworth to take him up on the offer _very_ seriously — he shows up at most classes, he comes with the actual reading material ready, he takes notes and actually asks questions, which means that whenever he shows up Stannis is honestly overjoyed or as close to as he can get, as it makes the entire affair entirely less awkward if someone’s, well, _interested_.

For that matter, a month after he starts attending, the man has caught up with _all_ of Stannis’s required reading, and Stannis _has_ seen that a few of his students weren’t too happy to notice that _he_ knows what Stannis is talking about while referring to how the disagreements in between the two Roman consuls helped Hannibal win Cannae and _they_ don’t, but too bad for them, he figures.

Too bad that it’s also the only highlight of his day work, these days — he comes back home mid-November with a bag full of papers to grade (some people had protested that Seaworth was excluded from the surprise test, but Stannis had replied that he wasn’t actually enrolled so he didn’t have to and _they_ did, Seaworth had insisted to do it anyway), his coat chilly with moisture and three groceries bags full to the brink.

The door next to his opens as he takes out his keys, figuring he’d drop the groceries in the kitchen before taking back his daughter.

“You know, you don’t have to shop for an army every other week when it’s two of you.”

Stannis doesn’t even bother getting offended — he never dealt too well with people mocking his habits, but his neighbor is an exception, if only because he always made it overtly clear that he doesn’t _mean_ it.

Differently from most other people.

“Jon, I might be hardly the best at raising children on my own but I’m _not_ feeding my daughter processed unhealthy food if I can just make it myself.”

“Hey, I’m just impressed that you’ve stuck with it this long, most people I know who actually tried to _make_ food for their kids rather than buying it lasted about two weeks. You’re getting her after you’re done bringing that inside?”

“Yes. I will be done in a minute, sorry if —”

“Don’t sweat it, she’s doing fine and it’s no bother.”

If Stannis believed in any kind of deity, he’d thank them every other day for the day Connington moved in next door just after that blasted interview in July, honestly. He quickly puts all his meat and vegetables and fruit in the fridge, shrugs off his jacket and places it on the entrance’s hanger, takes off his tie and walks out of the door — Connington is nowhere to be seen, but he shows up again in a moment with Shireen in the crook of his arm.

“There you go,” he says as Stannis takes her. “And honestly, stop apologizing, she’s a dear and she barely even cries, and it’s nothing new really.”

“Nothing _new_? I thought you said —”

“Yeah, Aegon’s been with me since he was six or so, but he has _another_ brother, long story, and that brother might’ve seen more of me than his own father for the first three years of his life, so — honestly, it’s _fine_. For that matter, given _why_ I work from home, I was flattered you’d even ask.”

Stannis, who is _not_ an idiot and has noticed that most of the friends Connington has over are men, that some of them have rainbow patches sewn on their jackets and that there’s no sign of any woman on the horizon, and who has _not_ told the man that there were a lot of reasons why his marriage didn’t work out, among which one he has never dared dwell too much upon because he just can’t afford that, too, would have been a right hypocrite if he refused to leave his daughter with _him_ when he’s exceedingly good with her. Fine, he also hasn’t told him that given that his younger brother’s into men for _sure_ and it’s not any of the reasons why they don’t get along he certainly wouldn’t care regardless, but that’s not the point either.

“Please,” Stannis says, “I think I’d trust you more with her than I’d trust any of my brothers. Well, have a good night. I’m off tomorrow, so I will most likely leave you to your own deserved peace.”

“As if, Aegon has friends over in two hours. _Peace_ might be overestimating it.”

 _Well, I will cross the friends coming over bridge when she’s older_ , Stannis decides as he goes back home. Shireen’s small, soft fingers have grasped at his shirt as she looks up at him with large blue eyes, and for the umpteenth time Stannis wishes he could ask his wife face to face how did that scar even make a difference, but she’s only talking to him through lawyers, so that’s not going to happen.

For a moment, he wishes he was the kind of parent who, when coming back home, can just — talk to their kids and say the stupid things that most people he knows who have children can instead of feeling words getting stuck in his throat and feeling ridiculous at the thought of _talking_ about generally silly things to his daughter the way most other people do to their kids.

Then he shakes his head and heads for the kitchen. He has to mince both meat and vegetables for the next week’s worth of meals for Shireen and cook himself something, _then_ he can worry about grading the papers. He’s tempted to give half of them to his daughter so she can destroy them to her heart’s will, but it would be an exceedingly bad idea, so he doesn’t.

——

Three hours later he has a week’s worth of meals ready (at least he can bring it over to Connington, he can’t certainly ask him to pay for _his_ daughter’s food), Shireen is intent on destroying some blocks tower she put together in the previous twenty minutes and he’s going through his surprise tests.

How do people manage to fail a test where nine questions on ten were multiple choice he doesn’t know, but he’s halfway through and half of his students did — great. _Now they can’t even guess right,_ he thinks. Then again, who the hell has decided that Cannae was in bloody 48 BC? He can bet money that they’re confusing it with Pharsalus, but if it’s the case the situation is very, very dire. He thinks about doing this for the next four years and feels like dying inside, then shakes his head and moves on to Seaworth’s test.

Which, turns out, is entirely correct. Or better, the multiple choice questions all are and it takes him a few minutes to decipher the one other that had an open answer because the man’s handwriting is honestly terrible, but when he does… well, it wasn’t _overtly_ detailed but it was correct on all accounts.

 _At least someone is paying attention_ , Stannis thinks as he sets it aside.

Turns out that he’s the only one who actually had _all_ of the questions right — at the end of it, half of the class passed and the other half failed, and Seaworth is the only one who answered all the questions right.

He groans, wondering if it’s because _he_ is a terrible teacher or if he just got unlucky with this year’s students, but — he knows that it doesn’t matter either way, it’s a public job and regardless of how bad he is at it he’s not getting fired, but _still,_ he’d like people he teaches to _not_ fail the damned class.

Well.

Maybe he’ll have better luck next time. Or so he hopes.

——

He _does_ point out to the rest of the class that the one person who technically didn’t fail one single question is the only one _not technically enrolled_ before sighing and telling them he’s not going to count this one test for their mark but that they should at least pretend to pay attention.

Seaworth is the only person in there who seems somehow amused by the entire situation — good thing _one_ is.

And after they’re done, he walks up to Stannis, handing him back an extra copy Stannis had lying around of Liddel Hart’s _Greater Than Napoleon —_ fine, it’s about Scipio, but if half of what they know of Carthaginian history is from Roman sources, that’s what they’re stuck with until someone else tackles the subject. _Maybe one day_ , he thinks wistfully, _that could be me_. “Thanks,” he says, “it was an interesting read.”

“At least you _are_ actually reading it,” Stannis sighs. “I’m obviously bad at this.”

“You’re not,” Seaworth says, but as sincere as he sounds, Stannis never liked flattery he doesn’t deserve.

“No, I am. Half of them failed it, it’s abysmal.”

The other man looks at him for a moment, then shrugs minutely. “Maybe, but if it changes anything to you, none of my high school teachers actually would have bet a dime on me passing _any_ kind of test.”

“What?”

“As stated, I wasn’t that great at _studying_ back in the day. And I think most of my teachers decided I was a lost cause regardless, but then again if you didn’t come from money no one thought you’d go anywhere. You’re still the only one I’ve ever had who actually is glad I attend.”

The man still sounds amused, which is a _good_ thing, really, because Stannis doesn’t know if he should feel embarrassed or he should just take that compliment for what it is, or if he should say something _nice_ like, _what kind of arses were your teachers_ , or —

This is why he’s _terrible_ at human interactions and ended up marrying his first girlfriend who proposed for _security_ because he was sure that it was a miracle that he even found a girlfriend in the first place, even if they didn’t even like each other and he had his suspicions at that point.

“Well, you’re the only one who actually seems to not hate my methods on principle, so… I guess it’s even?” It’s probably sad that Stannis’s track record in making friends has always been so abysmal that he thinks _maybe_ his neighbor counts as one and now he doesn’t even know what is he even aiming at here.

“Maybe it is,” Seaworth says, warmly, and Stannis thinks that his stomach closes up at _that_ , but not in the bad way. “That said, you mentioned you had more to read on Hannibal’s campaigns in general or do I remember wrong?”

“I think I do,” Stannis replies. “If you would follow me up to my office I have copies from a few articles lying around.”

“Sweet,” Seaworth grins, and as Stannis watches him leave some ten minutes later with a stack of photocopied material, he asks himself what the _fuck_ is he even doing here.

He wishes he knew.

He really, really does.

 

IV

 

It doesn’t feel exactly _adequate_ that it’s his daughter’s first birthday and he’s bringing her to _class_.

But that morning he hadn’t even asked — Connington left at the crack of dawn saying he had to go to a funeral in Melrose and Stannis could only imagine why, so he just gave the man his condolences and called Renly, who _of course_ wasn’t even home, so he had to be at Loras’s and he wasn’t going to call _there_ when he knows what they might have been up to during the night.

At that point, there really wasn’t much choice — not when he’s signed the divorce papers three weeks ago and he had to go to Selyse’s lawyer where he had found her signature in all the right places already. He _had_ asked the lawyer if she might want to see Shireen in the future, maybe once in a while, but the lawyer shook his head and said that the answer had been a resolute no, so it’s not as if he can call _her_. Not that he even wants to — his daughter’s about the only thing he doesn’t regret when it comes to his now-defunct marriage —, but it would be somewhat nice to have, well, _the option_.

Admittedly, he also wishes he could avoid his students knowing anything about his private life, but it’s not like he can avoid it now, so he’s going to deal with it and hope she sleeps through the class — same as half of his students, at this point.

They _all_ look fairly surprised when he shows up with thrice the bags he usually does have, pushing the stroller inside and parking it to the corner of the classroom.

He clears his throat. “Before anyone thinks of asking any questions: _yes_ , that’s my daughter, _no_ , I couldn’t find anyone to keep her today, _no_ , I’m not saying any more on the topic. And we need to go over the technical aspects of Hannibal’s defeat at Zama for the next two hours, so I hope _someone_ here knows what we’re talking about already.”

“Well, the elephants didn’t work out?” Someone asks — Stannis wants to groan out loud. Almost two months and the only thing they remember is the bloody elephants.

“… Not incorrect, but does someone know _why_ they didn’t work out?”

He’s met with silence.

 _Of course_ he is. He can see Seaworth at the bottom of the room who _looks_ like he might know, but he’s not answering — fair enough, Stannis figures, he probably doesn’t want to fuel more drama after the whole deal with the test.

“I see no one actually went through the required reading,” he sighs. “ _Again_. Fine. It was because Scipio figured out that they’d attack in straight lines only and made his plans accordingly, not just because _they didn’t work out_. Never mind. Does anyone even _have_ the required reading with?”

 _Two_ people have brought over both the selected parts of Polibius and Livy that they have been reading since this class started.

“Well,” one of the other know-it-alls from first row whose name Stannis can’t recall and most likely doesn’t even _want_ to remember, “you didn’t say we had to bring the texts over _today_.”

Stannis doesn’t grit his teeth just out of pure force of will. “I figured that it was implied that you _should_. Never mind that. Miss,” he tells one of the girls who actually _did_ have the books with, “would you care for reading from Polybius’s book fifteen, chapter eleven onward?”

She clears her throat and does — he glances at Shireen who’s just woken up, but given how bored the student sounds he’s not too surprised that she barely makes noise before going back to dozing. God, he _hopes_ she stays bored until the next two hours are finished. He stops the reading every time he has to specify something, goes through the entire strategy again, comparing it with Cannae’s and hoping they _actually_ remember Cannae’s tactics while he does it, reminds them that all of that needs to be compared to Livy’s chapters 32-36 for their final, and one hour and a half into this torture, he dares hope that they will be done without extra drama and he can go back home and… well. Come up with some semblance of celebrations, not that Shireen’s going to remember it but it’d feel _sad_ if he didn’t do anything now, right…?

Well.

He had _hoped_ , because at _that_ point she wakes up and starts crying, _loudly_ , and he’s about to excuse himself and check on her but the moment he sees one of the people in first row looking at him as if he’s extremely amused by his plight stops him in his tracks because _of course_ he’s never going to manage doing it in front of everyone, and he doesn’t even want to leave the room because he wasn’t exactly supposed to bring his kid in here, damn —

Seaworth stands up with a knowing face. “Maybe I could take her out for a stroll? No point in interrupting for everyone else.”

He swallows. “If you would be so kind.”

“No problem whatsoever,” Seaworth smiles — he stands up, brings the stroller out and closes the door behind him.

Stannis is going to have to thank him profusely, later.

“Professor,” one of the girl asks, “do you really trust _him_ with —”

“It’s not the first time it’s happened,” Stannis interrupts. “And he was trustworthy all the other times. Can we _please_ go back to the consequences of the defeat on _Carthage_ and not on the Romans?”

There are a few grumbles but they do, and when no one asks question ten minutes from the ending, he’s so tired and _done_ with this day that for once instead of coming up with something to pass the time, he tells everyone that they can be done earlier and to come back next Monday having finished _both_ sections of both authors.

Davos pushes the stroller back in not long after the last student is gone.

“There you go,” he says. “I think she just wanted attention.”

“I can imagine.” Stannis really hopes he’s going to get the hang of this single-fathering deal soon. Shireen deserves way better than _this_ and he shouldn’t just drag her around if he can’t find a better option, but what can he even do when his parents are dead, his relatives are useless and the waiting list for the only daycare in the area is endless? “Thank you again,” he adds, hating how awkward it sounds.

“It was nothing, really. She’s sweet.”

“If only her mother agreed,” Stannis blurts, and — _wait._ Why did he even say it out loud? He _shouldn’t_ have, it’s wholly inappropriate, and Seaworth certainly didn’t ask for it. “I apologize,” he says, “I shouldn’t —”

“It’s fine. You look tired, you have a right to complain. But — really? I mean, if you don’t mind me asking.”

Stannis would, from anyone else, but the man has only ever helped him out until now and he actually likes talking to him, so — no. He doesn’t think he minds.

“She was born premature _and_ caught chicken pox around — four months? Five months? I don’t know, but — I could already see that she, my ex I mean, had been regretting it even _before_ then, when we were told that the scar was there to stay she decided that it was a divine sign that her daughter was ruined and that we should have never been together in the first place.” He sighs. “She left and never came back.”

“… A _divine sign_ ,” Seaworth repeats, incredulous.

“She had — rather extreme positions when it came to _that_.”

“I suppose you don’t?”

He snorts. “I’m atheist, I _really_ don’t. Before you asked how we ended up together — she was the sister of someone my brother was doing business with, they introduced us at one of his birthday parties and… I never was great with women, she never had much luck with men, things happened and I think we only married because we thought we _should_. Then again, I should have called it off when I had to fight to get a civil marriage only.”

 _Never mind when I realized I only thought I was attracted to her while I really, really wasn’t_.

“That sounds like… neither of you had much luck.”

“We were terrible for each other,” Stannis agrees. “I mean, I don’t regret _her_ , but — it was a right mess. I just hope I do better by her from now on.”

“I think you’re being a tad too —”

“If you were about to say _hard on yourself_ , I don’t think having her spend her birthday _here_ is exceedingly good parenting.”

“Ouch. Is it?”

“Yes,” Stannis shrugs. “Not much of a celebration. And I am awfully sorry for dumping it all on you, I don’t know why —”

“I still think you’re too hard on yourself _and_ that as long as you don’t do it when she’s old enough to remember it, no one is going to blame you.”

“At least someone _does_ think that.” He takes a breath. “Still, thank you for doing that. You didn’t have to.”

“Oh, it’s been a hell of a long time since mine were that young, it’s not a chore. It’s nice to have a reminder of being young and stupid.”

Stannis takes a better look at him. He looks in his late thirties at most. _A hell of a long time_?

“You certainly aren’t… _old_.”

“I was nineteen for the first one and he’s been voting for two years, I might not be _old_ but sure as hell I _feel_ like it.” He shrugs. “And the youngest is going to vote in a couple _and_ I’m surrounded by eighteen year-olds in here, it’s kind of a given.”

“Well, you’re way better at reading what I assign than most of them. I imagine that you’ll want to be off now, so if I’m keeping you —”

“You aren’t.” He shakes his head. “She died a while ago. It wasn’t the best year of my life, admittedly.”

“I — I’m awfully sorry,” Stannis says. “I didn’t mean to —”

“It’s _fine_ , I wouldn’t have said if I didn’t want to. Anyway, the sons are all in Wales because it made no sense for them to move here, but I couldn’t work there anymore because the mines closed down _and_ , well.” He shrugs and takes off one of the gloves he always wears, and then Stannis notices that he doesn’t have _all_ the first joints on the right hand. “Mining accident,” he shrugs. “I couldn’t really work there anymore regardless, and on top of that I had to start writing with the left because it was too irksome and I got stuck with shit handwriting. Anyway, I figured I’d just change air for good and avoid England, this is why I ended up here of all places.”

“I — I see,” Stannis answers. Fuck, he always was _terrible_ at this kind of niceties, and it always sounded fake coming from other people when they were aimed at _him_. “If it consoles you, if you ever feel the need to enroll and take classes seriously, you don’t need whole fingers for this kind of career.”

“I’m sure I — wait. Are you _serious_?”

Thing is: Stannis actually _was_. It was the first thing that passed through his mind, for that matter. “Why wouldn’t I be? I mean, you still are the only person in this class who is actually learning something. High school marks mean nothing when it comes to pursuing something you have interest in.”

They stare at each other for one long, long moment, and Stannis is about to apologize for overstepping his boundaries, but then Seaworth’s lips curl in a small, _warm_ smile.

“I wouldn’t know, but it means a lot you’re actually serious about it,” he says, and then he excuses himself because that’s when his shift starts, and Stannis lets him go, figuring that he can just go back home and be done with university for this day.

It’s not the kind of lavish birthday he remembers from _Renly_ ’s first, he thinks sadly later as he dresses Shireen in a new dress he splurged money on specifically even if he tries to not indulge too much in unnecessary expenses.

But — most people he talks to keep on telling him that his daughter’s clothing (that he buys second-hand most of the time, so it’s not exactly _fancy_ ) might be _sensible_ but looks _sad_ , and Stannis has no clue of what’s even the difference, but he had walked into a proper shop a few days ago and asked the assistant for advice, and left with a hand-stitched winter dress in soft wool with flowers embroidered in the hems, and it does match her eyes and hair, admittedly.

He’ll do better next year, he decides.

——

Three days later, he’s finished another hellish round of trying to get his students to understand that there’s a reason why they’re reading from ancient Roman sources and not from some kind of summary available in the library when Seaworth comes up to him.

“I have two things for you,” he says.

“Two? I think I only gave you one piece of not-so-required reading.” Stannis is painfully aware that his attempt at joking most likely is horrible, but Seaworth does seem amused as he hands him back his stack of photocopies.

“Yes, that’s one. About the other, though…” He reaches down inside his own bag, and then hands Stannis a small woolen sack. He can immediately feel that there’s a carved figurine inside.

“Can I —”

“Sure. It’s not locked,” Seaworth says, and Stannis opens it. It _is_ indeed a carved small stag, but done _really_ exquisitely. “You _did_ say it was your daughter’s birthday, didn’t you?”

“I — I did,” Stannis says, “but you didn’t have to —”

“Oh, I didn’t spend a cent on it, I made it. I might not have been really great at studying back in the day, but I am quite good at manual things. I figured she might like a present.”

Stannis feels like his throat is completely closed up — he can’t believe that _he_ actually took time to do it and that he actually put effort into it when Robert’s gift arrived by mail. “I — thank you,” he manages, “I will give it to her as soon as I get her back from the saintly neighbor.”

“Let me know if she likes it. I just hope I didn’t overstep boundaries —”

“Oh, _please_ ,” Stannis snorts, “my older brother sent a package because he couldn’t bother to show up and turns out it’s clothes that she has already outgrown, the youngest sent _his_ significant other with their collective gift but didn’t show up himself and at least _that_ was appropriate, but with these premises I really think that you couldn’t overstep any boundary. Actually —” He starts, and then it dies on his lips.

“What?” Seaworth prompts.

“I — Mr. Seaworth, apologies if this sounds inappropriate, I guess, but given that you’ve kept my daughter twice already and I don’t know if I talk about my wife with _students_ , maybe — I think we already did anyway? I mean, I have a feeling we are… more on _friendly_ terms than anything else, so —”

“Honestly? I didn’t know how to breach the subject,” Seaworth says, sounding… relieved? “I had the same impression, but — never mind. And if we are, I think you can drop that _Mr._ , it feels awkward as hell.”

“Fine, _Davos_ , as long as you do the same.”

“Fair, _Stannis_ , far. Let me know how she likes it, then,” he says, and Stannis nods while his heart hammers wildly in his chest for reasons he’s nowhere near willing to consider.

Well.

At least they’re _friends_ now, aren’t they?

 

V.

 

 _Friends_.

As if.

Stannis pockets his keys after he locks the door behind his back — he put Shireen to bed ten minutes ago, he’s gone through half of his class’s finals and while it’s less of a disaster than any surprise test they’re still not optimal, but it’s their problem and they’ll have to come back next semester if they failed it, Davos’s is one of the four completely correct ones he’s seen until now, not that he had doubts on it.

Oh, and his daughter’s been sleeping clutching that wooden stag for the last month or so and they actually might have gone to get drinks once after class one evening — Stannis had only gotten some pomegranate juice rather than beer, but Davos didn’t joke about how he doesn’t really like alcohol as Robert usually does, and it had been a _nice_ time and he doesn’t remember the last time he actually went out. Was it with Selyse when they were still doing what poor version of dating they indulged into? Maybe. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t _want_ to know.

What he knows is that as crappy as he is at _this_ , he knows that people don’t usually feel their stomach constricting when they talk to their _friends_ , nor wonder how their fingertips (or _lack of_ ) would feel if they touched their skin, and he’s — fuck, he’s spent _years_ not even thinking about the mere chance that he might —

That _he might_ —

He saw how it was for Renly.

And Renly was _lucky_ , for that matter.

Renly had somehow always known — he told all of them when he was ten or so, before the car crash that killed both their parents, who had just shrugged and said they had suspected for a while, and that was it. Renly also has been with Loras since high school and fine, some people weren’t fine with it, but they were both nice, popular kids and they never were with anyone else, which meant that most of their friends didn’t stop talking to them just because they were together, they went to live in the same building the moment they finished high school (still not _together_ because they don’t know the owner’s stance on it, even if they’re planning to move in together anyway with some excuse about them being extremely close friends, if they don’t find out anytime soon).

Stannis never was _popular_ , never actually even talked to girls, never mind boys even if boys were the only ones that actually caught his stare once in a while, and there’s a reason why when he met Selyse and she actually seemed to at least talk to him he had figured that maybe _she_ was the right person.

Of course she _wasn’t_. She _wasn’t_ because he had no idea of how being with anyone he actually was interested in felt like, and because they were both working on the premise that no one else would want them so why not sticking together, and anyway if he had found a woman he could see himself with, _well_ , then it meant at least — he could do something _normally_ the way everyone else does. But no, he ended up mistaking what was most likely the both of them craving for _any_ kind of relationship, friendship or not (because Selyse was in the same boat as him, wasn’t she?) for interest, and she did, too, and here _he_ is, realizing that he actually never was into her and viceversa, and he most likely… always was into men in the first place and never wanted to admit it to himself.

Not that he ever thought there was something wrong with being into men, but when it came to _him_ , well, he didn’t have friends growing up because everyone in his classes thought he was no fun and only came to him for homework, anything he accomplished was always overshadowed by whatever junior championship Robert was winning or participating in at the moment, when he said he was going to study archaeology no one thought it was a particularly cool or wise life choice, and it’s not as if anyone he’s related to ever thought Carthage’s history was anything worth spending your entire life researching. At that point, the mere chance that he actually might _not_ like women (the way Robert did) felt just like the cherry on top of a cake he never particularly cared to eat, because if he couldn’t even talk to women or have a girlfriend like most people manage… how was he ever going to proposition a man?

Never mind that — well. He _could_ have asked Renly for advice. Of course he could. But Renly always was expansive, _popular_ and easygoing from the day he was born or something like it, and Renly never doubted once of his good looks, same as Robert.

Stannis, who _wasn’t_ graced by genetics with their flowing long hair or either Robert’s impressive athletic build nor Renly’s lithe, graceful shape, always felt like he was the midway in between those two but not the _good_ kind of, and that hadn’t really helped either. Never mind that he and Renly never had much of a relationship in the first place, so he really never felt the need to bare his heart out to _him_ of all people.

And... now he thinks he _might_ really have a thing for Davos Seaworth and he has absolutely no idea of how to deal with it, never mind that it’s probably hopeless in the first place — the man was _married_ with children and he certainly didn’t leave them when they weren’t even six months old, he doubts that he’d reciprocate.

Sometimes he wishes he smoked or _something_ of the kind because it seems like an excellent way to dispose of one’s stress, but he _doesn’t_ , and —

“Something on your mind?”

Stannis almost gasps as he looks to his right and sees Jon Connington standing right outside his door, wearing a heavy coat — he’s obviously just come back home and he hasn’t even heard.

“Maybe,” he sighs. “Sorry, I didn’t hear you.”

“I figured. Still, you really look troubled. Anything I could help with?”

Stannis is about to say _no_.

But —

Actually, _maybe_ it is something he can help with, even if it would mean saying out loud an amount of things that he never actually dared.

“What if it is?” Stannis sighs.

“Well, I could hear you out. I mean, Aegon’s out and I have nothing to do and I actually _could_ distract myself, so —”

“Just come in, I’ll make you some tea. It’s the least.”

Stannis opens the door, lets him in, tells him to just sit in the living room however he prefers, puts the tea on, thinks for the entire time about how to actually _say_ it, then figures that there’s no point in dancing around it.

“So,” he starts, “I — there’s no polite way to put this, I fear.”

“Then just say it not politely,” Jon says as he takes a sip.

Stannis takes a breath. “My older brother is hopelessly into women.”

“Very well.”

“My _younger_ brother has always been into men, but he also has only ever been with his — partner from high school. I — never really was great at talking to _anyone_ from either side, I always only ever looked at men _if_ I did but I never, you know, let myself acknowledge it, the moment I met a woman who seemed to, like, _not hate me_ we ended up into the worst marriage that could have been under the circumstances, and now I think I’m — I don’t _know_ what I am, but —”

“Let me guess, you _really_ like some guy and you don’t know what to do with it?”

“… What if I do?” Stannis answers miserably.

“For one, start with actually talking about this mysterious guy.”

God, he has to _talk_ about it? “We work in the same university,” Stannis sighs. “We met when I went there for an interview, I had to bring Shireen because Renly couldn’t take her, she was screaming her lungs out five minutes before I had to go in, he showed up, said he could take her, he looked trustworthy, he actually calmed her down in a second and didn’t run off with her, so I suppose I had good instincts. He also did the exact same thing when I had to bring her over to class once.”

“So he’s a student?”

“No, janitor, but he attends my class because he’s apparently the only person interested in it.”

“Hm. Go on.”

“I don’t — well, he’s from this mining town in Wales, he has some four or five other children, but the wife died and he couldn’t do mining work even if Thatcher hadn’t ruined their business because he had some accident that hurt his hand, and at least he _does_ go through the required reading.”

“Right. And how do you feel when you talk to this guy? Just checking.”

“Is this really necessary?”

“I’m afraid it is.”

He breathes in. “I don’t know, if he doesn’t come to class because he can’t move his shift around it’s a disappointment, the one time we went for drinks after it because we’re apparently on a first name basis now, I could barely drink because my entire stomach was clenching on itself all the time but not in a _bad_ way, when he handed me my glass in the pub my fingers brushed against his and I’m _not_ going to tell you what I spent the entire ride back home thinking because you don’t deserve to be subjected to _that_ , too, and I don’t know, I left my nine month old daughter with him when I barely knew his damned name, what else should I even say now?”

Jon takes another sip of tea. “Congratulations,” he says, “you’re _really_ into this guy.”

Stannis wants to die inside.

“And there’s nothing bad about it.”

“I _know_ there’s nothing bad about it,” Stannis sighs, “but — I don’t know what to do about it, I don’t even have a clue of what I should be doing here, it’s _probably_ inappropriate and with my usual luck he’s not even —”

“For one, people into _both_ exist, you know.”

“What —”

“You can be married to a woman and also be attracted to men without acting on it, and if he doesn’t _look_ like it — ah, well, I suppose it’s time for caring and sharing.”

He reaches into his back pocket, takes out his wallet and produces a folded picture. He hands it to Stannis.

Stannis opens it and — all right. There’s Jon standing next to this other guy, slightly taller than him, with a slimmer frame and long, shiny hair so blonde it looks almost silver, along with a pair of large purple eyes, who looks suspiciously like —

“Is that Aegon’s, uh, _father_?” He asks.

“Yes,” Jon sighs. “Now, if you look at the two of us and think about what movies would like you to assume, _which_ one of us you would think is into men only?”

“… Him, I guess,” Stannis answers.

“Exactly. Well, he _never_ was into guys and _I_ always was, which should prove already that this concept of _he looks like_ or _he doesn’t look like_ is ridiculous. You don’t know who people are into based on how _they look like_ unless they want you to. Other than that, whose idea it was to go for drinks?”

“Er, his?”

Jon nods, sipping more of that tea. Then —

“Do you want the honest advice?”

“Please.”

“Go for it,” he says. “I knew I had zero chances with Rhaegar — the guy in the picture — but I told him out of honestly and we stayed friends anyway, and there’s a reason why _I_ am raising his kid and he’s not staying with his grandfather. Long story. Anyway, I don’t think I ever got over him and I’m trying to, but it’s — a work in progress, I suppose. Meanwhile, I’ve been to three damned funerals in the last month only and half of the people I’ve known since I started attending the local GLF meeting place in what was that, late eighties, are either dead or not doing too well. What I want to say here is that this hasn’t been a very good decade and that if you want to come one of these days the guys would be only glad to have someone new. But regardless of whether you want to get involved or not — you really don’t have to, especially if you only figured it out now —, you _might_ want to give it a go. This — what’s the name?”

“Davos.”

“This Davos sounds like a nice guy, and if he’s not an asshole and not into either men or _you_ , if you make sure to tell him that if it’s a no you can handle it like an adult and nothing changes, most likely _won’t_ stop attending your classes. But can I tell you something else in all honesty?”

“Of course.”

“The only time I’ve seen you excited about anything as much as you were when talking about this guy, it was when you were talking about _your daughter_. I’d consider that. And if you ever want to come to one of those meetings at my local GLF, I usually go on Saturday afternoon. Don’t worry, no one there is going to judge you for not having figured it out when you were ten _and_ we don’t just discuss funerals.”

“I — I’ll consider it. Thanks, you didn’t have to —”

“Stannis, I _know_ I didn’t have to, but you can ask people for advice once in a while, it won’t eat you alive. I’m not going to say you could have told me a while ago because I _get_ it, I didn’t come out until I moved from my hometown in the first place, but — really. It won’t.”

“It just — well, it’s not that I never did, but it’s probably sad that this was the one time someone actually did actually give it to me. Some advice, I mean.”

Jon thankfully doesn’t comment and settles on finishing his tea while Stannis thinks back on the entire conversation.

Which — was entirely sensed advice now, wasn’t it?

Fuck. He should come clean, shouldn’t he? He never was good at skirting around this kind of thing at any point in his life. At least if it goes wrong he _will_ have tried, right?

Right?

——

 _Right_ his arse, because one thing is deciding to go for it, another is _how_ to go for it. It’s not like with Selyse he _did_ , they just more or less fell into it, and how is he going to do this now, walk up to Davos and confess his feelings and ask if he wants to come home for drinks?

Hell, _no_. Or better, he thinks it’s how most people would do it, but he’s _not_ most people and he doesn’t _know_ how to even approach it and he doesn’t want to go and ask Jon because that would be asking too much of the man, not after he actually sat through his rather undignified rant, but he’s _not_ going to ask Renly if it kills him, and Renly’s boyfriend is so _not_ an option, and —

Maybe he should go to one of those meetings, but — to ask for dating advice? It just feels wrong.

He’s still mulling over it two days later as he sits in his office going through the notes he received from Tunisia just yesterday when the phone rings.

He’s not surprised to hear Tyrion Lannister on the other side of the call, with a fairly disturbed reception. He tells Stannis that he’s going to send over more notes in the next month along with excavation pictures, Stannis says that he’ll be waiting, and _then_ —

“Oh, I was forgetting,” Lannister says, “a week from now Pycelle is holding the usual conference in Oxford.”

“What’s the topic this year?” That conference is exactly everything Stannis hates about academia — it’s invitation only. Stannis has no idea of _why_ — it’s not as if their field is so large that you’d need _invitation-only_ conferences, but no one ever said Pycelle wasn’t a man with quirks, never mind his entire court of acolytes. Stannis went once after his PhD, and it was admittedly extremely interesting when they stuck to discussing Carthage and not when it turned into academic drama, but he wasn’t invited again on account of the fact that he was supposed to go on excavations this year.

“Hannibal’s campaigns in Italy after Cannae. Of course I’m not going to attend, but Jaime said I got an invitation anyway and it’s for two people. If you want to go, I can tell him to bring it over at your office, it’s not as if I’d go and it’s not as if they even check, it’s all for show.”

“Well, if you would be so kind, certainly.”

“Great, I’ll tell him then. I hope the students aren’t being too much of a burden?”

“Not at all,” Stannis lies, and just after he closes the call, he realizes.

 _An invitation for two_.

Oh.

Maybe —

 _Maybe_.

Maybe _that_ might work, wouldn’t it?

——

“I was wondering,” Stannis tells Davos after the next class — at this point, they do always spend some ten minutes talking after it’s over unless Davos has to run to his shift. “Uh, I’ve got an invitation for this conference about Hannibal’s campaigns in Italy in Oxford. It’s — next Friday.” He swallows.

“So, no class I suppose?”

“No, but — it’s this rather ceremonial thing which is invitation only and it’s for _two_ people. The professor is — an authority, admittedly, but he’s fairly old fashioned and invites only his colleagues and their _plus ones_. So, I’ll probably leave Shireen with my younger brother if he’s available, but I figured I’d go since it’s still interesting material and they’re all good scholars, but I need a plus one and I honestly don’t know anyone else who’s interested _and_ would most likely enjoy it, so if you want to come —”

“Wait,” Davos says, “have you just said you want _me_ to come to some exclusive extra fancy seminar thing where people discuss Hannibal’s military genius for the entire day?”

“… Only if you want to or if you can,” Stannis replies cautiously. Davos _stares_ at him, for a long, long moment, but then —

“You know what,” he smiles, slightly, “why not.”

“Just if — wait, what?”

“Why not. Sure, I could do with a break from the city anyway.” He tears a page out of his notebook and writes down a number. “That’s the landline. Feel free to call whenever for organizing it, just not before eight PM because I’m usually not in.”

“Oh. All right. Of course. I’ll check the trains and so on and call you when I have them, then.”

“It’s a date,” Davos smirks, and then excuses himself because his shift’s starting in ten minutes.

Stannis should probably _not_ read too much into that _it’s a date_ , because _everyone_ says it and not to mean, well, _that_ —

Still, his fingertips are shaking as he slips the folded page into his wallet.

Well.

That’s good. He said yes. And they’re probably going to share a hotel room for two nights a week from now.

He figures that it _can’t_ be too hard to just — see where it goes, right?

 _Right_.

He can do this. He can _totally_ do this, or so he tells himself.

 

VI.

 

It’s probably telling that Davos might have gone and bought a suit for this, he thinks as he stands in front of the Edinburgh train station bundled in his old dark trench coat which might have seen better days but has suited him well until now. Then again, he might have looked up that one specific conference and after having seen the _specifics_ , he had realized that it was… the kind of fancy academical thing he only ever saw in movies before, and he’s _not_ going there in his old work clothes if he can help it. So he went and bough a suit secondhand — it’s very well-kept and after a round at the dry cleaner’s it looked new, and it’s safely inside his suitcase as he waits for Stannis to arrive. He should be here in five, and Davos _might_ have been early, but — well, he was kind of maybe worrying about this a bit too much, so he figured he’d come here with enough advance just in case.

He’s honestly kind of awed that he was invited along, for that matter, and he honestly hopes he doesn’t stand out too much in between people who are definitely more high class than he ever could hope to be, but — given how Stannis had looked surprised when he accepted, he has a feeling he’s not the only one feeling like a fish out of water here.

Actually, he has a few suspicions that —

“I see you’re one of the few people I know who is actually on time.”

Oh, _there_ Stannis is — Davos notices the usual dark bag along with a sensible, grey trolley. He’s wearing his usual old but well-well-kept Montgomery coat, a _nice_ choice if you ask Davos. Not that he ever had choices in buying clothes and so on, but he can recognize a good coat when he sees it.

“I don’t like being late,” he says. “So, our train is in twenty?”

“Yes,” Stannis confirms. “We should get there in some eight hours, then we have the train back at eleven AM on Saturday. Tomorrow, _technically_ , we could eat at the conference’s buffet, but the food there has always been abysmal as much as they like to pretend otherwise.”

“I can handle eating out twice in a while,” Davos says. “I mean, I hadn’t taken a vacation in forever, I think I can afford it for once.”

“Oh. Well, hopefully we’ll find somewhere not atrocious. Should we?”

“Sure.”

Stannis leads the way towards the train track, and Davos doesn’t want to see things that might not be there, but — the way Stannis had looked at him when he realized he was there already? He’s almost sure he was halfway blushing when he _asked_ , but — it’s been a long time and Davos is maybe getting ahead of himself here.

Probably.

Still. He’s fairly sure that the _plus one_ on the invitation is usually not for _fellow students_.

——

Thing is, Davos thinks as he entertains himself with the conference’s plan after Stannis excuses himself to get some sleep — apparently Shireen kept him awake all night —, he has the distinct feeling that this invitation wasn’t entirely _friendly_.

The problem is that he’s not sure of how to bring it up, but point is: he wouldn’t mind if it was the case. The _other_ problem is that he’s not sure of how to make that clear, especially because Stannis looks like the kind of person who _wouldn’t_ come forward about it in blunt terms, and — well. He could be wrong. Back when he and Marya got married, he hadn’t exactly needed to _court_ her or put it in subtle terms — they met in high school, they hit off, she was his second or third girlfriend (depending on whether that one fling he had for three days counts) but she was the one that felt _right_ , and they got married the moment they were both out of high school, and it’s not as if he ever looked at anyone else until she died. And after, well, in between that, his accident and the mine closing down, he hadn’t exactly had time to think about _romance_ and the likes. Since he came here, he might have had a few one night stands, always with women, but nothing much or of import.

Davos _also_ has always known that if he had the chance he wouldn’t say no to a guy he liked, and he never went and dwelled too much on it. First, because he knew there was nothing wrong with it and after spending high school in the local Labour party office (or better, the nearest one in the next town over because his own was so small, political parties didn’t bother establishing offices) he would have been a right hypocrite if he did, and second, because he knew that every other guy he knew was _not_ of the same mind, and then he got married and he wouldn’t have looked at anyone else on principle.

And fine, _maybe_ he has made sure to attend as many of Stannis’s classes as he could not just because he was genuinely interested in the topic — and he _is_ , or he wouldn’t have made copies of some fifteen books Stannis loaned him along with the photocopied articles. _Maybe_ he realized he actually liked the man after he went and told him bluntly that he actually _wanted_ him actively in his class, and he was sure of it by the time he offered to look after his frankly adorable daughter for the second time, but he also, well, never presumed to do anything about it. Never mind that according to Davos he has a very nice build, that those blue eyes are very becoming and that he appreciates a man who speaks his mind — Stannis never looked to him like someone who was interested in _dating_ period and he’s had enough bad experiences concerning class divide to know that hitting on a teacher would be at least frowned upon by most _teachers_ , at least where he comes from.

But now he’s apparently coming along as the _plus one_ to some exclusive conference in Oxford of all places, and — maybe it’s _friendly_. Maybe it is.

Still, he probably should keep his eyes open and see if he wasn’t wrong. He glances at Stannis sleeping on the opposite side of the train, and he actually doesn’t even look relaxed even as he does, which is — maybe worrying, but given how much he overtaxes himself, it’s probably not surprising. Honestly, he’s what, some twelve years younger than Davos is, he shouldn’t have that kind of lines on his face yet.

He swallows down his temptation to wake him up and ask him _did you really just bring me along for our shared appreciation of Hannibal Barca’s historical accomplishments,_ but he doesn’t.

He’ll have time, he thinks. Meanwhile, he’s going to read up on the lecture’s subject some more — if anything he’s not going to walk into it looking like a complete newbie at this, not when he’s spent the last few months actually reading about the aforementioned accomplishments in his free time as well.

He thinks about what Stannis had said.

That he could —

Well. Admittedly, Scotland has free tuition. He never thought he had the skills or the inclination for higher education, and none of his former teachers in high school ever gave him much credit beyond assuming he was good enough to scrape by. He’s not sure he can even see himself doing a job that doesn’t require physical labor, but — what if he _really_ has enjoyed reading up on ancient history, what if it’s not as if his life is so full of things to do these days that he couldn’t carve some time to pursue at least a bachelor’s, what if he _really_ could?

He doesn’t know yet, but he knows he didn’t even consider it before Stannis went and told him he _could_.

He shakes his head, settles into his chair and reads on.

It’s a long journey, after all.

——

“I’m awfully sorry,” Stannis groans as soon as they’re inside their room and they both noticed that there’s _one_ double bed and not two. “I’m sure I told them that I wanted a double, they must have figured it was — I can ask them to switch.”

Davos _has_ noticed that his cheeks got slightly darker.

“There was a sign saying it was all booked downstairs,” Davos says. “Also, I don’t really mind.”

“… You don’t?”

He shrugs. “I’ve slept in way worse places and that bed is enough for two. Of course I don’t. Unless you don’t feel —”

“No,” Stannis replies, maybe a bit _too_ soon, “no, if it’s not a problem for you, I can share. That’s — no problem at all.”

His cheeks are definitely flushing darker now. For a moment Davos wants to ask, but — no. Maybe tomorrow would be better. He opens the suitcase and takes out his new dark gray suit, hanging it.

“That’s — nice,” Stannis says as he does.

“Thank you,” Davos answers, choosing to _not_ say that he bought it for the occasion. “I figured I wouldn’t come dressed like a slouch.”

“Oh, it’s all — the worst kind of performative academia bullshit,” Stannis sighs, “except for the conference’s subject, so I guess you’d need suits. I brought one, too. That would work perfectly, I think.”

Davos _does_ notice that his cheeks stay flushed.

They don’t stay flushed through the dinner at the small Irish fish restaurant they find nearby, but they are again before going to bed that evening. They stick to separate sides of the bed, but far enough that they don’t touch or anything.

 _Tomorrow_ , he thinks. If anything, he always was pretty good at reading people.

——

“This is why I wanted to go on excavations,” Stannis hisses as they sit through the supposed opening ceremony — which has turned into the dean complimenting himself on the event’s organization. Davos _can_ sort of get it — until now it’s been all halfway fake pleasantries, and it’s been all self-congratulating talk rather than discussing the actual topic at hand. At least no one has glanced at him wrong or noticed him sticking out.

“Not much for people self-congratulating?” Davos whispers back.

“ _No_ ,” Stannis says. “Oh, when they start talking it _will_ become interesting. It’s just going to take them a _lot_ to get there.”

Davos has to give it to him; it does take them a lot, and he’s glad that the self-congratulation clocked in at half an hour or he’d have ended up fallen asleep, but when they finally are done and start actually discussing the matter at hand, things change.

And admittedly, this Professor Pycelle might be a bore when introducing his conference, but he _does_ know his military tactics, and Davos greatly enjoys the first three hours of discussion: he comes out of it with half a notebook filled with horribly written notes, not that anyone but him will understand them anyway, and by the time lunch break starts, he can see that Stannis looks… well, happy about what he just heard, but not exactly looking forward to whatever comes next.

“What’s the matter?” He asks.

“I got recognized,” he groans, and a moment later a woman dressed in a perfectly sensible dark red pantsuit comes up to them.

“Stannis Baratheon?” She asks. “How long has it been.”

“Professor Dustin,” he says, shaking her hand. “Indeed.”

“I thought that you would be off in Carthage by now? Or well, what’s left of it.” She lets out a small giggle. Stannis looks pained.

“I switched with Lannister,” he grits his teeth. “I had familiar obligations and couldn’t go anymore.”

“Oh, really? Such a pity,” she says, obviously _not_ feeling sorry. “Your article on the possible reconstruction of a possible map of old Carthage based on what ruins we have these days was _outstanding_ ,” she says, still faking it. Right, Stannis _did_ actually give him to read that thesis, which Davos found greatly interesting even if admittedly he’s read up more about the history of the place than about what Stannis _actually_ should be teaching.

“Well,” he replies, “there’ll be other chances.”

“And who’s your friend?” She asks, immediately noticing him. Davos is _really_ glad he wore the usual gloves right now. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him around the field?”

Stannis’s eyes go slightly wider and of course, they didn’t come up with a story or anything, but Davos was always good at bullshitting, if at _anything_.

“Davos Seaworth,” he says, extending a hand. “Delighted to meet you, Mrs. Dustin. We volunteered in a soup kitchen together for a while years ago before I moved to Ireland for work reasons, but I always had an interest in, hm, ancient history, so when I came back and we met for a drink or two and he told me he was coming here, well, I might have jumped on the chance, so to speak.” He’s fairly sure he’s talking like one of those articles he’s read for months, this is so _not_ his usual choice of words, but she looks impressed and asks no further questions before leaving.

“Thanks,” Stannis groans. “She was in my PhD committee. She thought I was too young and tried to make things harder, but that didn’t work out.”

“Sorry to hear it,” Davos says. “Do you want to get away or —”

“I wish,” Stannis sighs. “But — just stick to that story. It was a good one.”

Davos does, and for some reason no one actually contests it. For that matter, he’s apparently read up enough extra material that everyone buys that he’s _always_ had an interest and not something he discovered in the last couple of years and could only pursue seriously in the last few months. Stannis looks as if he hates every second of the event save for the actual talks, which somehow doesn’t surprise Davos at all; Stannis never struck him as the kind of person who’d enjoy this kind of mundane events, nor the whole atmosphere. It’s not like Davos ever had opinions on academia _in itself_ beyond cleaning floors in classrooms and fixing the heating more than once and generally doing his job, but after the fourth time Stannis obviously grits his teeth as he tries to _not_ talk about his reasons to not go on that excavation, he has a distinct feeling that Stannis really, _really_ hates the entire circus around research.

He doesn’t ask, though, not until the conference is over and when he asks if they should go back to the restaurant from yesterday Stannis immediately agrees and leaves, barely saying hi to anyone else.

“Let me guess,” he says after they’re sitting down and Stannis got rid of his tie — Davos _hasn’t_ but admittedly he hasn’t worn one in years, he thinks he doesn’t hate it —, “you _really_ don’t like what comes with the research or what?”

“No,” Stannis shakes his head. “It’s all useless, fake pleasantries, but let’s just say that half of those people have academically stabbed each other in the back even when it’s such a small field, I think Barbrey Dustin and Pycelle have been fighting for months over whose pupil should get the one teaching post they have for grabs in their department and — right. This is where I should say that the PhD thesis I wrote after six months on excavations was apparently groundbreaking, and a lot of them hated that I pretty much came from nowhere and I wasn’t studying with _any_ of them. I was granted that spot on the next excavation just because of that thesis, so now a lot of them are gloating I didn’t go. Then again, they still are great at what they do, which is why I still don’t think these conferences are a waste of time.”

“I noticed,” Davos says before reaching down for his fish. “Honestly, I guess — they were _very_ fake. Still, it was interesting.”

“If only we could do without the pleasantries,” Stannis sighs, looking down at his own plate and taking a bite of the side boiled greens. “The _fake_ pleasantries. Still, it’s — good to know you didn’t hate it.”

“Are you kidding me?” Davos shakes his head. “I mean, I think _you_ hated the whole charade more than I ever could and I still learned a hell of a lot and not just about Hannibal’s tactics. And it’s not like I get invited to fancy conferences very often.”

It’s too dark to be sure, but he’s halfway sure Stannis _did_ blush some, at that. Also, he can see that his hand slightly shakes as he puts back down the glass he had been drinking his water from.

 _Well then_.

“Any of the other _plus ones_ probably just got bored out of their minds,” Stannis says. “And — too bad. I still think that if you actually went for it you’d have more interesting things to say than half of them.”

“That might be a tad overreaching —”

“I don’t say things I don’t mean,” Stannis cuts him before bringing his attention back to the fish on his plate.

 _I imagined that_ , Davos thinks.

He swallows his food, and decides that _maybe_ , later, he could try to be a bit more forward.

Because if he’s _right_ —

Well.

Davos has spent years telling his own kids to go for it when they want something. Maybe he should take his own advice for real.

——

When they go back inside their room, Stannis excuses himself to use the phone — presumably to call his brother, Davos thinks.

“Renly? Yes, it went fine. How is — oh. Right, of course. I’ll call him then. I _figured_ he would be in. How — oh. All right. Fine, I won’t keep you, then.” The call is over and Davos _would_ remark that it was uncannily short, but then Stannis dials another number, clearing his throat. “Loras? Yes, he said she’s with you? Yes, of course, not a problem. Hm. Right, that’s usual. What — yes, sure, of course, just make sure she’s warm. I’ll be back in the afternoon, probably. What — oh. I _guess_ , but — I’ll let you know in case. Yes, thank you. Have a good evening, too.” He closes the call and takes a long, deep breath.

“Everything all right?” Davos asks, taking off his jacket and loosening the tie.

“Well, _yes_ ,” Stannis sighs, “I mean, as long as you take into account that _of course_ I left my daughter with _my brother_ but he promptly left her with his boyfriend, who’s admittedly a very nice person and at this point I probably talk to him more than Renly, but that’s normal.”

“ _Normal_?”

Stannis shrugs. “He’s not exactly in line to spoil the nephews, let’s just put it like that. And on top of that _he_ doesn’t even ask how I’m doing, the boyfriend tells me that if I need to take a longer vacation he doesn’t mind having her until Sunday.” He shakes his head and takes off his own jacket. “If _he_ is asking me if I need a longer vacation — never mind. I should have figured.”

Davos, who as an only son never experienced neither benefits nor disadvantages of having siblings, nonetheless has a feeling it’s not how it _should_ go.

“Not to be _that_ person but your brother sounds… not too great?”

“Please, don’t sugarcoat it. We never had much of a relationship in the first place, not that I had it with my older brother as well, and when Shireen was sick he maybe came to the hospital twice. And I mean, he _does_ look after her but it’s more because he feels like he _has_ to and the moment she actually starts talking — I just hope that I’ll find a place at the nursery by then.”

Davos can’t help cringing openly. “That’s — that sucks,” he settles on.

“I have a feeling it’s the story of my life,” Stannis sighs, “but thanks for the comprehension.”

“… That sounded a bit too harsh.” Not what Davos had meant to say, but he doesn’t want to overstep any boundaries.

“I don’t know.” Stannis _does_ sound like he’s very much done with this entire situation. “I mean, both of them, my brothers I mean, seem to remember my number just if they need something, I had no help whatsoever when it came to do what I wanted with my life _and_ I had to give it up for years. And — I wouldn’t give up my daughter for the world, but what do I tell her when she grows up, that her mother walked out of her hospital room when they told us that she’d be fine _bar the state of her face_ and said she didn’t want anything to do with the worst decision she made in her entire life?”

“… Such as?” Davos prompts when Stannis doesn’t go on even if he sounded like he needed to get her off his chest.

“Getting married to a desperate person out of mutual desperation and losing three years of her life meanwhile?”

 _Ouch_. “That’s — unfair,” Davos says, moving closer.

“She wasn’t wrong,” Stannis sighs. “Well, she could have been less horrid about it, but it’s true that we ended up married because we settled and thought we couldn’t do any better.”

Davos puts a hand on his shoulder. Stannis _doesn’t_ move. “That’s still unfair. I mean, I don’t know about _her_ , but you’re nowhere near that bad that you should _settle_.”

“That’s extremely nice of you to say, but I don’t see a line outside the door now, do I?”

Now, that was the point where someone with just _friendly_ intentions would have told him that surely he could have better chances with others and no one needs a _line outside the door_.

Except that they’re close enough that Davos can see Stannis staring at his mouth just after he says it, and maybe Davos’s experiences with guys don’t go beyond looking or talking with his neighbor — who’s _definitely_ not straight —, but some things are fairly universal, he thinks, and no one who’s not somehow attracted to you stares at your mouth just after discussing how terrible their sentimental life happens to be.

“Maybe there’s no line,” Davos agrees. “But what if there is _someone_ beyond the door?”

“There — there is?”

Davos looks up into blue eyes that _definitely_ don’t look like they expected it.

Ah, well, fuck it all, he decides, and kisses the man already.

For a moment neither of them moves any further and Davos hopes that he hasn’t overstepped boundaries, but then Stannis lets out a small sigh and parts his lips and —

 _Fuck it all_ , really, and so he actually _moves his hands_ and puts one at the back of his neck and the other on his face, and when Stannis kisses him back very, very cautiously he doesn’t try to make it faster or anything — it’s not the same as kissing girls, true, his lips are thinner and rougher and the light stubble under his palm feels strange for a moment, but the only substantial difference is that he’s never been with anyone who kissed him back as if they couldn’t quite believe they were kissing in the first place.

A moment later, Stannis’s hands go to his hips, very tentatively. But at least they _did_.

He moves back when he feels like he has to breathe, figuring that maybe they should talk, and when he looks back at Stannis his cheeks are _definitely_ flushed, his fingertips on Davos’s hips are slightly trembling and he looks like he really, _really_ can’t quite believe they’re doing this.

“There’s been for a while,” Davos finally says. “And I suppose I wasn’t wrong when I thought you actually were interested?”

“I don’t invite people to conferences I would gladly not attend if I’m not — wait, you _knew_?”

“I didn’t _know_ ,” Davos says, “but you were giving a few hints. And I figured I’d see if I was wrong or not.”

“You — you aren’t. But — _really_?”

“I could ask you the exact same thing, for that matter.”

He can see Stannis’s throat working up and down, and when he reaches up with his right hand and brushes over it with his shortened fingers Stannis shivers underneath, but in the _good_ way.

“I might have thought about _that_ ,” he says, almost inaudible.

“Well,” Davos replies, pressing just a bit further against his neck, “I don’t know about you, but there’s a perfectly good bed right over there. If you want to move it there, I’m not going to say no.”

The tip of Stannis’s tongue runs along his lower lip, once, twice. “I wouldn’t say no. But — fair warning, I never — I mean, I only ever was with my ex and —”

“Oh, I’ve never been with guys either,” Davos shrugs. “I just always knew that I wasn’t against the idea if I ran into a guy I actually liked. In between the two of us, we _could_ figure that out.”

“What — if it sounds like a good idea?” Stannis’s voice is so low, Davos is wondering if his throat has gone dry. It might.

“Then as much as I admire Hannibal’s tactics, I don’t think _idleness_ is my thing. Or, what did that other book say? _Languid idleness_?”

“Have you just —” Stannis says, sounding like he absolutely didn’t expect it, but then a snort leaves his mouth, then _two_ , and Davos doesn’t know if he’s ever seen him laugh properly but this is the closest he’s come to and he thinks he really, _really_ likes the sight.

“I just did,” Davos confirms, his hands moving downward, along Stannis’s back.

“I think I can work with that,” Stannis manages to say as he tries to catch his breath, and a moment later they’re both stumbling towards the bed — Davos kicks off his shoes and he can feel Stannis do the same as they fall on it rather ungraciously, but he’s not really thinking about _that_ now. He gets rid of his tie, throwing it on the side. He’s ended up on the side of the bed, kneeling while Stannis is sitting up and unbuttoning his shirt. Davos can’t help sneaking glances at his chest as he slowly takes it off — he likes that Stannis has large shoulders but is pretty lithe underneath, and he’s quick in getting rid of his own, trying to not rip the buttons off.

Then he finds Stannis _staring_.

“What,” he says, “enjoying the view?”

At that, Stannis goes even redder, but he keeps on staring. “God, this is _embarrassing_ —”

“Please,” Davos interrupts, “it’s sex, nothing to be embarrassed about. Also, if someone enjoys the view it’s only a compliment.”

That’s also when he realizes that they’re actually not in the best circumstance to do much — never mind that neither of them has condoms with, but he’s clean and he’s fairly sure Stannis is, too, he’s _fairly_ sure they’d need lube and he doesn’t have any, either. Well, there’s other options for now, but actually —

He moves on top of Stannis, who is absolutely _not_ moving nor trying to take charge.

“I was wondering,” he says. “Didn’t your brother’s boyfriend say we actually could wait until Sunday to come back?”

“He — he did. Why?”

Davos’s hands go to Stannis’s belt, getting rid of it. “Well, as much as I _really_ want to do this,” he says, throwing it to the side, “while I don’t have the experience either I _think_ that we should have at least lube, and we don’t, but you could take him up on that offer.”

“I — oh, for _once_ — I’m calling him later,” Stannis says after thinking about it for a long, long moment, and sounding like he’s surprised of himself for having agreed in the first place.

“Good,” Davos grins, “then I think we can make do for now.”

He gets rid of his own belt, throwing it to the side and figuring it’s high time they get naked, and then notices that Stannis has also done that, but he took the time to fold the clothes before throwing them on the nearest chair. Somehow, it’s such a thing he could see Stannis doing that he can’t help smiling slightly at the sight.

“I just,” Stannis says as Davos moves back on top of him, “it’s not like I have great _experience_ in general but —”

“Stannis?”

“Yes?”

“I don’t have it with _men_ ,” Davos says, his hand running down his sternum, stopping just above his groin. “But if there’s one thing I got so far it’s that _this_ is really not rocket science.”

“It kind of always felt like that,” Stannis groans, sounding like he’s somehow not too proud of it.

“Then I think it should be rectified,” Davos says, and leans down to kiss him again while he moves his hand down — again, he never had sex with a man but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t know what _he_ likes for himself, and he’s fairly sure that you really can’t go wrong with exchanging handjobs out of everything. Stannis moans into his mouth the moment Davos reaches down and wraps his fingers around his cock, not that he wasn’t hard already, and he makes a point of taking his time — he doesn’t try to push it, he strokes it firmly but not too fast, runs his thumb just under the tip once, twice, and he can feel Stannis’s hands grasp at his back _hard_ as he squeezes. He feels precome coating his palm not long into it, and for a moment he thinks that maybe he should just go for it, but —

But _maybe_ not.

It’s not as if he ever gave head to another guy but he sure as hell liked it on the receiving end, so how hard can it even be? And given how coiled and strung tight Stannis still is, maybe he should aim a bit higher than trading handjobs like teenagers when he hasn’t been one for a hell of a long time.

Right then.

He moves away, kissing his way down Stannis’s throat, and then _down_ , and he doesn’t tell Stannis to relax just because it’s obvious that it’s not gonna happen if he _says_ it — he moves his hands to his hips, going farther down the bed, and all right, _here it goes_ , he thinks, and moves his head back, taking the tip of Stannis’s dick in his mouth and running his tongue along it, and _then_ he feels Stannis almost arching off the bed even if he doesn’t quite do that.

Well, he’s not fucking it up, he figures, and so he takes in more, and _more_ , until he has a good half of it in his mouth (he’s not risking it all at once if he’s never done this before, maybe next time), and as he starts sucking he can feel Stannis’s fingers tentatively touching his hair — _good_ , as far as he’s concerned — and while he doesn’t tug nor push him downward, in between that and the fact that he’s moaning against the pillow, he thinks he’s not winging this too badly.

He knows he’s _not_ for sure when not long later he has precome all over his beard and he can feel Stannis’s hips arching up under his hands, and he can feel that Stannis must be close but is still not just letting go, and he can feel the bed creaking just slightly. Well, _fine_ , maybe he just has to try and up the ante a bit — he moves his right hand downward, since it _did_ seem before that Stannis didn’t mind the shortened fingertips, and gives a stroke to the top of Stannis’s erection, then two, then moves his hand behind it, grasping at his balls slightly but enough to put pressure, and at _that_ he can feel Stannis saying something and tugging at his hair, but that’s not the point — he stays where he is and when he comes inside Davos’s mouth he tries to swallow as much as he can, then realizes that he might _not_ manage it and so he moves back but strokes him through it regardless, bringing himself back up on the bed and crashing their mouths together just as Stannis’s hand clamps behind his neck and kisses him —

And _he’s not holding back now_.

Turns out that when he’s not overthinking things, Stannis Baratheon _can_ kiss you like he means it and not like he can’t believe it’s happening, not that Davos minds — all the contrary. He’s barely even paying attention to _his_ raging erection until Stannis’s fingers fumble downwards as he mutters something about having been a complete idiot and he starts jerking him off, not slowly and not taking his time, but Davos has honestly been turned on since he realized he actually had read the signs right and he’s not really expecting or waiting for finesse. Also, it’s been a long time since he’s had sex with _anyone_ , but good thing that he’s way past the time he’d feel embarrassed for how little it takes for him to come against Stannis’s hand, his muscles giving out as a rush of pleasure runs through him again, and again, and _again_.

By the time he’s caught his breath after falling back down on the mattress, Stannis is doing the same and opens his eyes a moment later, looking at him as if he’s not quite sure the fairly terrible state of the sheets is their fault.

“I —” He says, then shakes his head. “I should call Loras and tell him I’m not coming back tomorrow.”

“Good,” Davos says, “because as good as this was, I don’t think we’re quite aiming high here.”

“Listen,” Stannis replies, “this will sound _horribly_ awkward, but I don’t think I’ve ever had sex that I actually _liked_ before, so —”

“Well, it was plenty good, but I think that on a scale from Zama to Cannae, it ranks around… siege of Saguntum? I think we should strive for Cannae here, no reason to settle.”

Stannis’s blue eyes narrow slightly, but _then_ —

“Oh, for — have you _just_ —”

“I suppose our friends at the conference wouldn’t appreciate, but —”

Davos never finishes that sentence because that’s when Stannis lets out a _proper_ bout of laughter, not a hint, to the point that he has to wipe at his eyes when it doesn’t stop for a few seconds.

“They wouldn’t,” he finally says, “but I think I do, as long as you _never_ share that chart with anyone else in my class.”

“Oh, they barely even talk to me, I don’t think it should be a problem.” He turns on his side, his hand grasping Stannis’s. “And for that matter, again, I’ve been interested a while. If you are as well, we can strive for Cannae at any point past tomorrow, too.”

“And what if I’d — be interested in such an attempt?” Stannis asks, his fingers tentatively grasping Davos’s.

He squeezes back. “I think it’s absolutely doable. And maybe we can stop there and try to never get to Zama, for that matter,” he says, and then leans down just as Stannis bends his neck forward, their mouths meeting again.

Yes, Davos thinks, he’s entirely looking forward to it, and _maybe_ he could also tell Stannis that he’s really thinking about enrolling next year.

But that’ll be for later.

Much, much later.

 

 

End.


End file.
